


Baseball Is Like A Game Of Go

by TheSwingbyJeanHonoreFragonard



Category: Stray Kids (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Baseball, Board Games, Comedy, Confessions, M/M, Pining, Second-Hand Embarrassment
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-22
Updated: 2019-09-22
Packaged: 2020-10-26 02:00:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,867
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20734382
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSwingbyJeanHonoreFragonard/pseuds/TheSwingbyJeanHonoreFragonard
Summary: Approach.Invade.Encircle.Capture.





	Baseball Is Like A Game Of Go

It was the most cliche thing ever which was why Chan couldn’t believe it when it happened; when his quiet, comfortable afternoon was smashed into roughly 34 pieces of varying sizes and then scattered across the hardwood floor around him. 

“The fuck?” Mouth agape, Chan hooked a thumb over his shoulder in the direction of the window. “Did- Did that…?” _ Did that really just happen? _

Woojin must have been a soldier or something in his past life because he didn't flinch despite the terrible noise of breaking glass. He didn’t even look up. “Hmmm? Complete sentences, please.” 

“Woojin,” Chan exhaled. “Did that just happen?”

“Did what just happen?” Woojin looked up at Chan from across the table, eyebrows raised in genuine confusion. It was a hot afternoon and he had completely shed his light gray blazer and loosened his plaid teal tie. His sweat-damp hair was held out of his eyes by a butterfly clip stolen off some girl’s desk. “You’re still not being specific.” His gaze dropped back down to the game they were in the middle of. “What are you talking about, Chan?”

“What am I talking about? _ Hello _?” Chan held out both of his arms.

Hesitantly, Woojin tore his eyes away from the game board that sat between them and, based on his gasp, took in the sight of the shattered glass across the floor around them for the very first time. “Oh.”

An ‘oh’ was all Woojin could offer? “A baseball came sailing through the window,” Chan exclaimed, in case Woojin couldn’t put two and two together. “It nearly took my head clean off!” The baseball in question was still rolling across the slightly uneven club room floor, settling against the closed door with a quiet _ thump _. 

Woojin looked up at the wall behind Chan. At the window that was now missing an entire pane. A pane that had been intact mere seconds ago. He shrugged. “Don’t try to distract me. I still have time to make a move.” Unbothered, he turned his gaze back to the Go board between them, a tiny white stone expertly held between the index and middle finger of his left hand.

“Woojin!” Chan yelled. 

“What,” the guy asked incredulously, still contemplating his next move.

“A baseball just came through the window.”

“I know. You just told me.”

“That was so dangerous. I could have gotten hurt!” Belatedly, Chan reached up a hand and gingerly touched the bleached curls on his head, swiped a palm across the back of his neck. No blood. No cuts from falling glass. Thankfully. He brushed his hand over the shoulders of his dress shirt and was surprised that there was only a single glass shard chilling out in the crook between his neck and shoulder. “The baseball team is going to pay for this!”

Woojin frowned. “No, I think the student council will just take it out of their club funds, won’t they?” He slapped his hand down on the board, depositing his white stone piece in a relatively aggressive move that left a pair of Chan’s black pieces quite vulnerable to capture.

“I don’t mean actually _ pay _ for it with money. I mean, I’m going to get back at the losers for this. _ Someone’s _ getting a stern talking to. They could have killed me!” Chan had been sitting cross-legged on the floor but now he was clambering to his feet. His wide hip bumped the low-sitting table in his haste, sending the furniture sideways. The black and white playing pieces rolled off the game board and went sailing over the table edge in a clatter.

Woojin choked back a scream as he watched every move they had spent the last hour making vanish in an instant. “Hey, you just ruined the game.” He threw himself to the right, landing on his side on the wooden floor. He used his palms to keep the small stones from skittering into the club room’s dusty corners, never to be seen again. “I was winning, too!”

He was, having captured five of Chan’s pieces to Chan’s measly two, but that wasn’t the point! 

Chan rushed up to the club room’s one window, standing on his tiptoes to peer through it without risking putting his hand on the sill, jagged pieces of glass like wolf’s teeth jutting out of the frame. “Hey,” he screamed into the stifling afternoon air. “Are you fucking serious with this shit?”

One of the baseball team members was sprinting across the manicured grass towards them.

To really sell his distress, Chan wailed, “My friend got hit in the head. He’s unconscious because of you!”

The player stopped short a little shy of the busted window and stared up at Chan with an unreasonably amused smirk tugging the corner of his lips. “Hey,” he called out, breathless and casual.

“Did you hear anything I just said?”

“No,” the player responded. His white pants were stained green across both knees from the grass. “I knew you were yelling but-” He took an additional moment to catch his breath. “-couldn’t make out what you said.”

“My friend is hurt,” Chan lied through his teeth. “Get the nurse.”

The guy did not look the least bit alarmed. He came a step closer, his cleats crunching on the gravel. “Oh man. The window is totally smashed. Sorry about that.”

“That’s all you can say?” Chan’s eyes went wide. “Sorry?”

The player peeled their teal and black striped cap off of their head with one hand and then, with their other hand, raked long, calloused fingers through their inky black hair. “Yeah, sorry is all I’ve got, bro. I don’t have any cookies on me.” He deposited the cap back on his head - backwards this time - exposing a sweat-drenched forehead and the rosy flush of his freckled cheeks from all of his running. “Can you toss that baseball back?”

_ What? _ Chan fumed. “My friend is bleeding from the head!” He swung a hand to the right to indicate Woojin only to swat the dude in the chest. When had he stood up? When had he come to the window?

“Hmm?” Woojin didn’t seem offended by the strike to his body. “Bleeding from the head? Who?” He twisted around and stared into every corner of the club room as if he didn’t already know that he and Chan were the only two members of their academy’s Go club. “Who got hit? Where?”

Chan sighed. He returned his attention back outside the window. “How did a baseball come flying through the window anyway? Isn’t there a fence?”

“Yeah,” the baseball player said but then supplied no further explanation. Quite a ways behind him, several other members of the team had approached the part of the fence closest to them. They shouted, some of them in horror at the destroyed property, others in excitement at the brewing confrontation. The baseball player held up their palm. “Can you toss the ball back? Please? Coach gets pissed at us if we lose track of too many of them.”

“I’m not giving it back to you,” Chan protested. If anything, he could use it as evidence when he reported this to the academy director!

The baseball player rolled his eyes, losing his patience. “Bro, they’re expensive. Do you know how much a pack of the shits cost? Do you know how easy they are to lose?”

“Good. Maybe you’ll learn not to throw them through windows!”

The guy’s mouth fell open. “I didn’t_ throw it _.” He spun around and pointed to the team gawking at them through the fence. Chan spotted the name LEE emblazoned in large letters across the guy’s shoulder blades. “One of our batters hit it. Get mad at him, not at me.” He turned back and glared up at Chan with new malice in his eyes. “Throw the ball back.”

Chan puffed out his chest defiantly. “No.”

“Don’t make me climb up there.”

Chan pointed at the triangles of broken glass on the sill between them. “Be our guest.”

Woojin gently nudged Chan aside. Careful not to catch his knuckles on broken glass, he tossed the baseball out of the window. “Here you go, Felix.”

Apparently that was the guy’s name. “Thanks.” Felix effortlessly caught the thrown ball singlehandedly and proceeded to walk away as if that was _ it_. As if that were the end of things.

“Hey!” Chan shouted at the dude’s retreating back. “You can’t just leave.”

“Yeah, I can.”

“Get back here.”

“I’ve got practice, bro,” Felix responded over his shoulder. 

“Hey!” Chan screamed again. Really, he would have jumped out of the window to run after him if it weren’t for all the broken glass.

⚾

Chan took numerous photos of the destruction with his cell phone and then walked all the way across campus to the new administration building. He hiked up two flights of stairs and stomped down the ridiculously long hallway to get to the student council’s office.

The match against Woojin had dragged. It was later in the afternoon than Chan realized. The sunlight outside was already turning golden and it poured through the windows in the hallway in brilliant diagonal streaks, making the mica in the floor tiles sparkle.

Forgoing the courtesy of knocking, Chan grabbed the door handle and shoved it open, not caring that the door flew out of his grip and banged against the wall like a thunderclap.

His dramatic entrance was met with silence. All ten chairs around the long wooden table in the center of the room were unoccupied. The plush, high-backed chairs beneath the windows stood empty. Even the president’s desk at the head of the room opposite Chan had no one sitting behind it. He had missed his chance! Chan checked his phone for the time. It was after 5. Encroaching fast on 6PM. The council’s after school meeting was long over.

“Hello,” Chan tried anyway.

“Can I help you?”

The voice was so light and thin that Chan thought it was his own conscious. He whipped his head left and right but didn’t see anyone. “I’m here to… report damaged academy property.”

There was a faint creak from one of the couches as the weight on top of it shifted. “You got time to fill out a damage slip? They’re on that table.” A disembodied arm poked out from around the side of the couch and waved in the general direction to Chan’s right.

More curious about who he was talking to than the necessary paperwork, Chan left the doorway and stepped into the room, the plush carpet as soft as a down pillow under his shoes. The student council’s office was decorated more like a fancy hotel room than a space for student government. The valences above the windows looked expensive. A chandelier with teardrop-shaped crystals hung in the center of the room. Through the big bay window covered in pillows and paperback novels, Chan could see the fountain in the academy’s courtyard three stories below. Chan stopped a few steps short of the couch. He hesitated for roughly five seconds before making up his mind and rushing forward.

Stretched out on his back across the cushions like he had just woken up from or was about to take a nap, was a short and kind of chunky dude. Lollipop in his mouth. Nintendo Switch in his hands. Uniform shirt unbuttoned enough to expose the razor sharpness of both of his collarbones and a scandalous amount of his toned, tanned torso. He looked up from his game long enough to acknowledge Chan’s presence. “I said the table’s over there.” He pointed with his chin before returning his attention to his game.

Chan could just barely make out the name tag pinned to the guy’s rumpled shirt. “Look, Changbin. A dangerous object came hurtling through my club room window. I’m injured and want to file a claim.”

Changbin noisily slurped on his lollipop and used his tongue to push it from the right side of his mouth to the left. “Fill out a damage slip.”

Chan sighed. “Changbin, look… I just-”

“There should be plenty of pens over there.” Since Chan was standing at the end of the couch near his feet, Changbin raised one leg and pushed Chan back a step with his foot. He wasn’t wearing socks and his heels were slightly dirtied.

Chan wiped a hand across his slacks where Changbin’s toes had touched him. “I have photos of the incident.”

“And I’m sure they turned out great. Now fill out a damage slip.” 

“You’re not paying attention.”

“No. _ You _ aren’t paying attention. Fill out a damage slip. You’d have been done by now if you’d listened.” Changbin turned up the volume on his Switch in a desperate bid to end the conversation.

Chan would not be swayed. “A whole window was broken. Shattered! Will the baseball team be punished?”

Changbin pulled the lollipop out of his mouth. It was purple and had stained his tongue the same vibrant color. “We’ll probably just take the repair costs out of their club funds next month.”

It had been exactly what Woojin had said. Chan approached the couch. “But aren’t you mad at all? I mean, I was nearly injured!”

“Nearly injured?” Changbin caught him in the lie. He pushed the lollipop back into his mouth. “I thought you said you were hurt and wanted to sue?”

“I-” Chan stood there for several seconds as his brain did a soft reboot. “You aren’t worried about this at all?”

Changbin raised his bare foot which was enough of a threat to make Chan back away. “Please, for the love of God, fill out a fucking damage slip.”

Chan raised a fist, feigning punching the dude, but he lowered his arm to his side. “Hey… Changbin… Are you saying that the baseball team won’t be disciplined at all?”

“Would you look at the time?” Changbin raised his wrist towards his face and checked an imaginary watch. “I’m suddenly off-duty.” He leaped up from the couch with ridiculous alacrity and was out of the council office with the door shut behind him before Chan could even call his name again.

Defeated, Chan walked across the carpeted floor towards the table pushed up against the wall. There were all sorts of slips and forms and documents and brochures lined up across the long, dark, wooden surface. There was even a stack of blank squares of paper next to a suggestion box. The damage slips were easy to find and even easier to fill out. Changbin had been right. Chan could have had ten of the things filled out in the time he’d spent fussing with the student council member. He filled in the blanks on the damage slip, purposefully writing small so that there’d be enough room on the lines for him to exaggerate. He finished and dropped the slip inside the indicated metal tray on the table. What surprised Chan the most was that there were dozens of other damage slips filled out by students with today’s date on them. Students reported faulty water spigots, janky bathroom stall locks, flickering light bulbs and, yup, a few cracked windows.

With that out of the way, Chan grabbed a blank square for the suggestion box.

_ Get a new _, he wrote. Treasurer? Secretary? Auditor? Historian? God… President? 

Chan didn’t know the proper title but he readied his pen regardless.

_ Get a new Changbin _. He folded the paper and shoved it into the slot at the top of the suggestion box.

⚾

The window was replaced with shockingly little fanfare. With all of the resistance Chan got from the council member the other day, he had expected the club room to be unusable for days but the academy had the window repaired and all of the broken glass bits swept up off of the floor by the end of third period the next day.

Chan had been told that but he hadn’t believed it until he went downstairs to the room, unlocked and swung open the club room door and stared at the neatness inside. 

Chan couldn’t help but be... disappointed. 

He didn’t get to raise half as much hell about the broken window as he’d wanted to! His post about it (with zero comments) had already been buried on the academy forum beneath numerous other topics and miscellaneous discussions. He had only received two signatures on his petition to disband the baseball team (and the second one hadn’t even been Woojin’s!) Hell, he hadn’t gotten around to printing the THIS PROPERTY WAS VANDALIZED BY THE BASEBALL TEAM poster he had stayed up until midnight designing.

He shook his flash drive in the air like it had betrayed him. “I was legit on the way to the student store to print it out!”

Woojin, as always, was focused on the most extraneous fact. “Hey, they cleaned the cobwebs out of the corners. That’s swell. I could never reach them. I’ve been asking for a step stool all semester.”

Their club room was tiny and always smelled musty even when Woojin cleaned. The club room technically wasn’t a club room. At least not like all of the other ones on campus. The classic literature club, the art club, the calligraphy club, the tea ceremony club, and even the manga club all had dedicated rooms that were about half as large as a classroom. Then again, those organizations had many members. Even the tea ceremony club had at least ten students!

The Go club, on the other hand, only had two members and, technically didn’t have to have an advisor.

It was more of a ‘Here, clean out this old storage room at the end of the hall. Just please put a halt to your fifty slide PowerPoint presentation’ kind of situation as opposed to the academy’s actual interest in having a Go club on campus but, hey, Chan still considered it a victory. And having an actual room to set up games at lunch time was far more convenient and far more quiet than trying to find a table in the cafeteria or something.

But...

Chan slammed the club room door shut and wiggled the handle to make sure it was locked.

Woojin protested, “I was about to chuck my backpack in there!” It was half-off his shoulder.

“Let’s just go to the caf,” Chan told him. “I’m not in the mood to play during lunch today.” He would say anything except acknowledge the absolutely wacky fear of his that another baseball would come sailing through the window if they went inside.

⚾

It was easy to spot the baseball players in the cafeteria and not just because they were always together. Like college frat boys constantly repping their Greek letters, the baseball players sported their jerseys instead of their uniform dress shirts, the vibrant stripes poking out from beneath the wrinkled lapels of their blazers.

Chan paused in his shuffling towards their table. When they were all clumped together, they could be a tad intimidating. Not due to their size, because they didn’t have much of that, but just their sheer _ number _. He watched them joke and laugh and throw balled-up napkins at each other. How could they be so carefree when they’d ruined everything yesterday? Chan nearly lost his nerve. No, he did lose his nerve. He was about to turn around and scamper back to the table he and Woojin had claimed when he spotted one of the baseball players on their own.

“Hey,” Chan shouted over the din of echoing voices in the caf. He recognized this one! “Felix!”

Felix stopped walking, his metal lunch tray in his hands. He looked left and then right to locate who had called his name. He looked straight at - straight through - Chan _ twice _before acknowledging the guy standing in front of him. “Wait. You talking to me?” He pointed at himself.

“You’re the only fucking Felix on campus,” Chan told him.

“Ugh. You and your temper.” Felix rolled his eyes. He started to turn away. 

Chan rushed to step into his path. 

Felix widened his eyes in exasperation and pitched his usually low voice an octave higher in impatience. “What do you want, bro? It’s sweet potato pancake day.”

“Who was the one who hit the ball through the window yesterday?”

You would have thought Chan spoke in gibberish. Felix blinked hard. “What?”

“Who broke the window?”

“I don’t know.”

Chan propped his hands on his hips. “How do you not know? Weren’t you out there, too?”

“I play right field, bro. I’m never paying attention.” Felix started to step around Chan’s broad frame.

Chan grabbed him by the arm. His fingers dug into the soft material of Felix’s blazer but, beneath that, he could feel the tautness of Felix’s surprisingly muscular frame. “And I bet that’s why you didn’t catch the ball that ended up going through the window.”

“The ball went through the window because it was impossible to catch.” Felix swatted Chan’s hand off of his arm. “And the only bro on our team who can pop a ball over the fence like that is probably Kim Seungmin.”

Chan glanced over his shoulder at the table full of dudes joking around and snatching food off of each others’ trays. “Which one is Kim Seungmin?”

“That one,” said Felix. In the least subtle manner possible, he held up an arm and pointed.

The guy in question must have sensed their eyes on him. He paused in his joking to tilt his head in their direction.

“Hey, Seungmin,” Felix hollered. “This guy-” He reached out a hand and slapped Chan on the back. “-has a bone to pick with you.”

Seungmin’s gaze slid over from Felix to Chan and the eye contact was like sticking a fork in an electrical socket.

“Shit,” Chan cussed.

Of course of course of course.

“What do you want,” Seungmin asked loudly.

The volume of his voice made the other baseball players pause in their joking. One by one by one by one, they all looked up to stare at Chan.

Seungmin smiled politely and leaned back in his chair. “Do I... know you?”

Felix rushed to fill in the gaps. “He’s mad at you for breaking that window yesterday.”

Of course of course.

Recognition sparked in Seungmin’s brown eyes like fireworks. “Oh, the guy who-”

Chan gulped and spun away before he could hear whatever insult Seungmin had primed and ready for him. He took all of two dazed steps before running his hip into the corner of a table, nearly falling over in the process.

A chorus of laughter erupted behind him and he felt his face flush bright pink with humiliation.

“Shit,” Chan hissed.

_ Of course _ Kim Seungmin would be cute as fuck.

⚾

“Your turn,” Woojin complained. “Jesus.”

Chan sat up, appalled. “Wait, wait, hold up. I can’t rush you but you get to rush me?”

Woojin just stared at him. He had peeled out of his blazer and unbuttoned his dress shirt to expose the tank he wore beneath it. His hair was plastered to his forehead with sweat, even with the battery-powered fan held directly in front of his face. He looked absolutely miserable. “You’re making us sit outside in this heat so, yes, I’m rushing you.”

“You can’t rush Go,” grumbled Chan, turning his attention back to the game board.

“Yeah, you can. Especially when we’re _ outside _, Chan,” Woojin reiterated. “Please.” He pinched his dress shirt between two fingers and fanned himself with it but it did not help in the humidity.

Classes had let out for the day and Chan had somehow managed to convince Woojin to take the board outside for a match. It had been a good idea. In theory. Their cramped, dusty club room used to be a storage area so it wasn’t like they had air conditioning. Being outside sounded better than being all stuffed up indoors. So they went outside. But not just _ anywhere _ outdoors. Not some place that would make good sense like the amphitheater or beside the fountain in the front courtyard or in the cool shade of the pagoda outside of the art building or beneath the breezeway that connects the cafeteria to the main academy building.

No. They were on the bleachers next to the baseball diamond. Right behind first base. Because of reasons.

Just... not any reasons Chan wanted to put out in the open.

The cicadas in the trees out by center field constantly screamed. The noise of traffic on the nearby highway was like the thundering roar of a river. Then there was the repetitive _ thonk! thonk! _ as metal baseball bats sent cowhide baseballs out into the field. In other words, being outside was kind of distracting during a game like Go. But Chan was putting up with it which meant Woojin better put up with it, too.

“Why are we out here?” Woojin demanded. It had to have been the fourth or fifth time he had asked in the last four or five minutes.

Chan looked to his right towards the baseball diamond, watching the batters as they waited in the dugout for their turn. The angle was bad. Plus the fence was kind of in the way. He could see but he couldn’t really _ see _. “I have to discipline the baseball team since the student council won’t do it.”

“Watching them practice is disciplining them? Or is it disciplining _ us _?” Woojin swatted at a bug zipping about near his neck. “Your turn. You’re nearly out of time. Five seconds. Four. Three...”

Chan, pressured by Woojin’s whining, made a poorly thought out move. A bold approach towards the center of the board that Woojin could very easily get out of if he had the free turns to pincer. 

Woojin must have come to this same conclusion because he sucked on the back of his teeth disapprovingly and mouthed the word, “Sloppy.” He picked up a white stone as if ready to block Chan’s move but then hesitated. Such an easy move surely had consequences. He glanced over at Chan’s blank, unreadable face. Woojin bit into his bottom lip. He could have countered but he second guessed himself and placed his stone, making a rather safe connection towards one of the corners, nowhere near Chan’s aggressive invasion.

With the turn back on him, Chan exhaled through his nose and stared at the board, weighing his possible options. “Should I just go for it or should I… back off?”

Woojin said, “Looks like you’re going for it to me.” He stared at Chan’s black stone towards the center of the board.

Chan hadn’t been talking about Go, he’d been talking about Seungmin. “Wait,” he huffed. He’d been talking about _ Seungmin _? He shook the ludicrous thought from his head.

“I am waiting. It’s your turn,” Woojin pressed.

Not putting too much thought behind it, Chan slapped down another black piece. It, too, was near the center of the board.

Woojin scrunched up his nose at the recklessness. His best strategy would be to make his own moves near the center of the board and prevent Chan’s hostile takeover but Woojin was still unsure. A move so obvious was clearly the wrong one to make. Right? He gently placed his own white piece along the side of the playing field, making a cautious play of his own.

Chan twirled a blonde lock of hair around a finger as he focused and then lost focus and fell deeper into distraction. All he could think about was Seungmin and his easy smile and those nicely rectangular teeth of his. No matter how hard he tried to think about the game, his thoughts never strayed too far away from Seungmin. It was just so odd. He hadn’t even properly met the guy. He wasn’t even completely sure if he had all of Seungmin’s facial features memorized!

“Chan,” Woojin’s gravelly voice sliced into his thoughts. “It’s your turn. My God.”

They had already been playing for quite some time so they were approaching the mid game, where both players had enough pieces on the board to start making meaningful attempts at capturing. The majority of the action was taking place in opposite corners of the board. Woojin had started to build an impenetrable wall in one corner but Chan had crept in, turn after turn, setting up a relatively wide blockade and splitting Woojin’s defense in two. In the other corner, it was an entirely different story. Woojin’s attack from two sides had forced Chan to play all the way back to the edge of the board just to dissuade Woojin from approaching.

In all honesty, Chan had the advantage. His string of ladders across the sides of the board made it risky to play towards anywhere except the remaining relatively empty corners. But Chan was about to inadvertently throw his lead. Chan placed yet another piece towards the center where there was very little momentum to gain.

Woojin kept his expression blank. His eyes darted from one corner of the board to the other, taking in the whole game rather than keeping his focus zeroed in on one corner. Chan’s strange moves irritated him, in a way, and made him question if there was a strategy he’d yet to come up with, a weakness in his formation he had yet to discover and make moves to protect.

“Fuck. You’re right. It _ is _ hot out here.” Chan hiked up the cuffs of his slacks, exposing his pale, hairy ankles. There wasn’t much of a breeze to cool him off but freeing more of his body from his sweat-sticky clothes just felt nice. He yanked his tie loose and undid the buttons at his throat. In a moment of forgetfulness, he relaxed too much and his bare leg touched down on the scorching hot surface of the sun-baked bleachers. “Shit!” He jumped.

“Shut up,” Woojin grunted. “You’re so noisy over there.”

“It’s your turn,” Chan got him back. “You’re running out of time. Six. Five. Four.”

Woojin figured it would be safer to ignore Chan’s unorthodox plays at the center and sat his white piece down. He was about to box Chan in against the side of the board and it worried him that so many turns had passed without Chan noticing and countering.

A particularly loud cheer from the baseball diamond made Chan turn his head.

Kim Seungmin had just stepped up to the plate.

Chan nearly gasped at the sight.

Seungmin was quietly attractive, Chan noticed. Not loud and boisterous and kind of dangerous like most handsome guys tended to be. Seungmin’s good looks were more refined. Softer. Chan dared to call him tame. Seungmin had a long face with rounded and doughy cheeks, big ears and a steep nose. He had wide eyes that displayed his every emotion and pink, plump lips with a pronounced cupid’s bow. He was… puppy-like, Chan decided as he watched, but with the baseball cap pulled low over his forehead and eyebrows knitted with deep focus, Seungmin looked like a puppy that would _ bite _. The batter swept his cleats over home base, kicking red dirt off of it. White pants and striped teal socks clung to lean, sculpted calves. His jersey almost seemed a size too small for him and was as tight as a second skin across the wide expanse of his back and the meaty length of his biceps. KIM was in bold black letters across his shoulder blades.

He wasn’t Chan’s usual type in the slightest but that didn’t stop his attraction and definitely did not stop the spike in his heart rate as Seungmin pulled off his cap to shake out his thick head of shiny, dark brown hair before flattening the cap back over his skull.

Another round of cheering and applause came from the other baseball boys as their star hitter warmed up with a few slow swings. 

“Wow, can he hit me over the head with that thing?” Chan didn’t know what came over him.

Fortunately, Woojin was right in front of him but still managed not to hear him.

Seungmin readjusted the glove on his right hand and then spit into the dirt. He took up position at home plate, feet shoulder-width apart, knees bent.

But something was odd about Seungmin’s positioning. Why was he facing the other way?

Then it clicked in Chan’s head. “He’s left-handed.”

“Hmmm? You say something,” Woojin wondered.

Chan snapped out of his thoughts and turned towards his friend, terrified at the knowledge that he’d spat his thoughts out aloud. “Nothing.”

Woojin pressed his fan against his forehead but it offered him very little relief. “You’re nearly out of time. Eight seconds. Seven. Six.”

Chan hardly glanced at the board. His heart had left the game about five moves ago. He grabbed a black piece, blew over it like he was wishing for luck or something equally ridiculous and then placed the stone down haphazardly, continuing his dangerous ladder of approach towards the center of the board.

Woojin balked like he’d been slapped across the face before he reeled his expression back to something neutral. He couldn’t tell if Chan’s wild moves were genius or simply reckless. His own moves had been too safe, too defensive, and now he was forced to choose between continuing to trap a few of Chan’s pieces against the side of the board or make moves to block Chan’s attempts at the center. Still fearing the center was a trap in some way, though, Woojin ignored it and successfully boxed Chan in along the side of the board.

Back on the diamond, the pitcher hurled a fast ball and Seungmin swung low and upwards and powerful. The satisfying _ thonk! _ of impact made Chan look up just in time to watch the ball cut impossibly high into the blue sky. Chan was looking straight at the ball, or thought he was, but he temporarily lost sight of it against the white of a cloud. 

Chan looked back at Seungmin, who was so confident in his ability that he wasn’t watching the ball. He stared down at his cleats, using his bat to pop loose clods of dirt loose from the teeth. Chan looked over towards the outfield just as the scrawny center fieldsman took off running towards the fence. He was nowhere close when the ball came back to the earth and smashed against the fence with a ferocious clatter.

The players in the dugout cheered.

Chan suddenly liked baseball.

Impatiently, Woojin groaned, “Your turn.”

Chan spent all of five seconds glancing around the board before depositing yet another black piece near the center of the board.

Woojin wasn’t intimidated. He placed his white piece down along the edge of the board, successfully ensnaring one of Chan’s pieces. He removed it from the game slowly, watching Chan’s face carefully for any sign of a reaction.

There was none.

No grunt of frustration, no crease of concentration across his forehead, no lip bite as he realized he’d made a mistake. Chan simply floundered another turn by irresponsibly placing another black piece towards the center of the board.

Only then did it dawn on Woojin that Chan wasn’t making bad plays. He just wasn’t paying an acceptable amount of attention to the game at all. Woojin let out a deep, tired breath as everything started to make sense. “What’s his name?”

If Chan had been even a _ hair _ less attentive, he would have fallen into the trap and easily supplied Seungmin’s name. Instead, he said, “It’s your turn.”

⚾

It was between first and second period the next day when Chan spotted Changbin in the crowded hallway. He almost didn’t recognize the guy. He looked so different when he was wearing his uniform correctly. Changbin hadn’t noticed him yet. He carried several textbooks under his arm and the two lollipop sticks jutting out from between his thin lips kind of looked like walrus tusks.

“Hey,” Chan said, cutting through the bodies in the hallway like a shark through water. “Changbin! Seo Changbin!”

Changbin saw Chan approaching him and his face paled. He pointed like Chan was a charging bull. “You again?” He turned around and ran up the hall in the direction he’d come from. Literally _ ran _! Chan watched him duck into a side hall, out of sight.

“Are you kidding me,” Chan grumbled then, louder, “Changbin! Wait. Hold on.” To his left was another side hall, a narrow space lined with lockers that connected the building’s two main halls in an H-shape. Chan rushed down the corridor, doing his best not to bump into anyone as his classmates congregated in front of lockers. When he made it to Main Hall B, he searched the crowd for Changbin. “Where is he? Where’d he go?”

The guy was hard to spot. He was _ just _ short enough to all but vanish behind everyone’s shoulders.

Chan looked left and right. He spotted someone who he thought was Changbin and poked them in the shoulder.

When they spun around, though, it was some short-haired girl. “Sorry,” he told her, backing away from her. He raised his voice, “Changbin.”

Nothing.

Even louder, Chan yelled, “Changbin!”

Changbin gave away his position by screeching, “Pleasepleaseplease fill out a damage slip!”

Chan whirled in the direction he heard the voice. There he was! Trying to make a run for it! “Wait up!” 

“Fill out a damage slip.”

Chan started down the hall after him. “I have to ask you something.”

“I can’t help you until you complete the proper forms.” Changbin rushed back down the side hall in the direction of Main Hall A, not slowing for a second.

“Dammit!” Chan kicked at a locker in frustration. He didn’t have time for this! The tardy bell for class would ring soon and he still had to book it up the stairs. “Wait up. Changbin!” He turned around and ran up the side hall near him back towards Main Hall A. He couldn’t keep this up. He was running out of breath. He stopped running and propped himself up against a locker, breathing hard and heavy. It took him longer than he cared to admit just to get a deep enough breath sucked into his lungs. At a much more manageable pace, he walked up the last little bit of hallway. “Maybe if I sneak up on him…” He poked his head around the corner at the exact same time Changbin poked his head out farther up the hallway. They made eye contact.

Changbin’s eyes got comically large. “DAMAGE SLIP,” he screamed at the top of his lungs, startling the students nearby.

“Changbin, wait!” Chan reached out towards him but it was too late. Changbin had ducked back into the side hall. “Fuck,” Chan hissed. He was going to fucking lose it. He jogged back towards Main Hall B but couldn’t even manage that for long before he was forced to slow down to a shuffle. By the time he got there, the hall had emptied considerably as more students made it to class. 

Winded and annoyed, Chan half-limped up the hall, searching for Changbin. The little guy was nowhere to be found. Not in the tiny little nook next to the water fountains. Nowhere.

Chan passed the side hall that Changbin had ducked into only to wish he hadn’t.

Changbin stood at the far end of it, way back in Main Hall A. He saw Chan gawking at him and blew a raspberry at the dude. “Idiot,” Changbin taunted, and then took off running again.

Chan slapped his own forehead when he realized he’d just been played like a villain in a Saturday morning cartoon. “You’re impossible,” he groaned, knowing Changbin was too far away to hear.

The tardy bell rang. Dejected, Chan started his long, late migration to his next class.

All Chan wanted to do was ask if Changbin had a copy of the baseball team’s game schedule.

⚾

With a hall pass tucked into the back pocket of his slacks, Chan stole away to the computer lab on the first floor during third period. He waited at the open door for several minutes and then slipped into an unoccupied seat in the corner when the teacher wasn’t looking.

The room was full of the hazy white noise of fingers clacking away at keyboards and Chan found it simple to add his own clickety-clacking to the fray.

He was here to do research, he told himself. Absolutely basic and not-creepy-at-all research.

He was just curious. He just had to _ find out _ something. Nothing more.

So he searched.

The academy’s official website was a surprising wealth of information. He hadn’t expected it to be such a strong starting point. On one page, there was a long list of links to online newspaper articles about the baseball team, summaries of the games they won and lost that season, the announcement of athletic scholarships their third-years were being offered and a complete run-down of the second-year upstart Kim Seungmin. Apparently, he was actually a big deal.

There was a video on the website. Chan muted the volume and hit play.

It was Seungmin all geared-up in a batting cage. One by one, the machine hurled balls at him and one by one, Seungmin swung and hit them. His form was… elegant. Chan knew no other words to describe it. Seungmin was able to make something as plain as swinging a bat look like a dance. A work of art.

Maybe it was his height. Or maybe it was his confidence. Or maybe it was the heavily practiced ease with which he propped the bat on his shoulder after every swing. 

Or maybe it was the brilliant smile that remained plastered on Seungmin’s face the whole time.

There was something about him, Chan knew. There was _ something _about Kim Seungmin that made it impossible for Chan to look away.

Yes, Chan definitely liked baseball now. He was a brand new fan. Did the team have a fan club? He was about to become president.

Chan found the team’s profiles on a different part of the academy website. The members of the team had their names and field positions listed next to their portraits followed by a long table of all of their stats for the season. He scrolled past right fielder Lee Felix, second baseman Yang Jeongin, pitcher Lee Minho. Kim Seungmin’s profile was halfway down the page. Chan knew next to nothing about baseball’s technical terms so the acronyms like SO and RBI and SLG meant little to him and he _ definitely _ couldn’t make heads or tails of any of the other numbers or what a .331 AVG meant.

“You know,” came a voice from his left side, “I can introduce you to him.”

Chan clicked on a different link and finally found what he was looking for: a schedule for the baseball team’s games. There was a home game that upcoming Friday. He wondered if he could trick Woojin into coming with him.

“Your name’s Chan, right?”

Chan looked over. Only then did he figure out that the low voice was directed at him. And wouldn’t you know it? Of course! He shrieked, “Fel-”

Felix slapped a hand over Chan’s mouth and put a finger to his lips to signal Chan to hush. They both looked over their shoulders but Chan’s outburst had somehow managed not to catch the teacher’s attention. She remained next to the projector, going over the difference between accounts payable and accounts receivable. Felix looked back at Chan and lowered his hand from the upperclassman’s mouth. “I can introduce you.”

“Introduce me,” Chan repeated, dumbstruck. “To who?”

Felix jerked his head towards Chan’s computer monitor where a high-res image of Seungmin’s face took up the entire screen.

Oh.

“He’s been asking about you,” said Felix.

Embarrassed, Chan closed all of his browser tabs. “All of this was open when I got here. I was trying to look up-” He said the first thing that came to mind. “-baby names. I’m pregnant. Bye.” He stood up and rushed out of the computer lab, ignoring the whispered cry of his name from Felix.

Chan was halfway down the hall back to his class when what Felix had said managed to worm its way into the dead center of his brain. The realization made Chan come to a halt where he stood. “Wait… Kim Seungmin has been asking about me?”

⚾

“I refuse,” said Woojin after listening to Chan explain his plan. “I’m not playing Go outside again. I’m not sweating my fucking balls off.”

“Come on,” begged Chan. 

“Once was more than enough. I’m still finding dirt and grass and tiny little bugs among the pieces.”

“You like cleaning, don’t you?”

“I’m leaving, Chan.” Woojin gathered his things and then zipped up his backpack.

Chan leaned over the table. “Just one more time.” He grabbed Woojin by the wrist and gently tugged. “Just one more day. I just want to see- I just want to play outside again. It challenges me.”

“You threw the game because you stopped paying attention halfway through.”

“I’ll give you every shred of my attention this time. I swear on everything I fucking love.”

Woojin peeled his hand out of Chan’s grasp. “Go by yourself. I’ll just find someone else to play with.”

Chan’s eyes lit up. “Really? You know, we could really use more club members.”

“Goodbye, Chan.” Woojin swung his backpack over his shoulder and stood up to leave the club room.

“Woojin, I’m begging. I’ll kowtow if i have to.”

“I’m going to go, Chan.”

“But it’s an official club meeting,” Chan insisted.

Woojin paused at the door. “Then I’ll say this as club president.” He met Chan’s eye. “Meeting adjourned.”

⚾

Chan went outside to watch the baseball team practice.

He was significantly early, so he sat out there alone, long before the team strolled out onto the grass. The team talked and laughed, though they were too far away for Chan to really hear anything that they were saying. The boys had their baseball bats and ball buckets in their hands, most of them were already sweaty even though they had yet to start warm-ups. 

There were so many of them, but Chan could easily pick Seungmin out of the crowd. He was the tallest one, plain and simple. That and the outlined number 9 across the left side of his chest made him easy to spot.

“They are just practicing, you know,” Woojin stated.

Chan startled. Woojin stood next to the bleachers, staring down at him looking bemused. Chan relaxed. “Thought you weren’t going outside?”

Woojin sat down on the bleachers a row or two beneath him. “I said I wouldn’t go outside to play Go.” He restated, “They’re just practicing.”

“I still want to be here,” Chan said quickly, “to offer moral support.” 

“Moral support for what? Jumping jacks?” Woojin squeezed his nostrils shut to fight back a sneeze.

“Have you tried doing those? They’re kind of tough.”

“I’ve never done a jumping jack in my life.” Woojin peeled out of his blazer and then draped it over his head to keep the beating sun off the back of his acne-scarred neck.

“Maybe you can do a few if you had someone offering moral support.”

“I’m working up enough of a sweat just sitting here. Thank you.” 

They fell into silence. Chan watched all of the baseball players run through their stretches, counting off the repetitions in unison. They moved with quite the synchronicity. If any of them were uncomfortable in the heat, they didn’t allow it to slow their movements.

Time and time again, though, Chan’s gaze fell on Seungmin. Even with his long, gangly limbs, he moved gracefully. Chan had never been so entranced! Lateral raises? Squats? Lunges? Who would have thought working out could be… kind of cute?

And who would have thought Seungmin would look absolutely smoking hot in a uniform?

“You would rather watch them do toe touches than play a game of Go with me?” Woojin actually sounded a bit wounded.

Chan popped the knuckles in his hands. “You don’t have to sit out here with me, you know.”

Silence. Hot, humid silence.

Then Chan said, quietly, “We can play tomorrow. I promise.” The silence crept back over them and Chan wished he could at least see Woojin’s face. “I’m not going to stop playing Go with you.”

Woojin made a noncommittal noise at the back of his throat. It was probably the best Chan was going to get out of him.

He turned his attention back to the baseball diamond and watched as the baseball team finished their stretches and lined up in mirroring rows so they could start tossing and catching. With each successful pass, the players took an additional step apart, increasing the distance. For every dropped ball, they closed the distance, jeering at each other. The rhythmic _ thwack thwack thwack _ of the balls landing in the players’ mitts was oddly therapeutic for Chan. It kind of reminded him of the sound Go pieces made when they were placed on the board. Oh, there was just something so thrilling about athletic events! There was something exciting and kinetic about tossing balls back and forth! “I think I finally see the appeal of sports,” he said.

Woojin moaned, “Really? Where? I fail to see it.”

Chan stood up, moved down the stairs and sat down next to Woojin. He looked at his friend. Woojin’s face was a little red from the heat but some of the color was also from a foul, bitter mood. “One day,” Chan said cheerily, “we’ll be good enough at Go that we can go to tournaments and people will buy tickets to watch us play.”

“I thought you hated baseball,” Woojin said, derailing Chan’s attempt.

“I never said I hated them,” Chan corrected. “I was just… upset that they smashed our window.”

Woojin nodded slowly, mouth open in surprise. It was just like Chan making a move towards the center of the Go board, leaving his corners unprotected. Woojin made a bold advance. “Do you even know anything about the team?” 

“Of course I do,” Chan huffed defiantly. Now he was a bit thankful for his ‘research session’ in the computer lab. “Since the start of the season, we’ve won eight games and lost three.”

“We?”

“They. _ They _ won,” Chan corrected. “They also have a game coming up this Friday.”

Woojin paused. He ran a finger over his bottom lip as he watched Chan make bad move after bad move, leaving his defenses wide open. Woojin played another piece, preparing to box Chan into a corner. “Well, who is who on the team?”

Not realizing he was being set up, Chan cheerfully pointed them out. “Lee Felix is right over there. He’s one of the outfielders which is shocking because he can’t catch anything. Han Jisung’s the one chasing after that stray ball. He plays third base. The tall, skinny one over there is Hwang Hyunjin, their catcher. That one with the backwards cap is Lee Minho, the pitcher, and the- And the- And the-” Chan stuttered uncontrollably. “And the one approaching us right now is-”

“Hey, Chan,” Kim Seungmin called out. He leaned against the fence directly in front of where they sat on the bleachers. “Can you toss that over real quick?” He stuck a finger through the link in the fence and pointed towards their feet.

Chan followed his finger but didn’t immediately see what it was Seungmin wanted. “Huh?” 

“To your left,” Seungmin said, still pointing. “Just a tad. Behind your shoe.” 

Chan looked down between his legs, searching the flattened grass and dirt at the base of the bleachers. He leaned forward a little and then he saw it: a stray baseball. Chan practically dove for it, grabbed it and nearly crashed face first into the fence when he stepped forward. 

Wow. This was his first time being so close to Seungmin. This was his first time really acknowledging their height difference. Bewildered, Chan pressed the ball against the fence close to Seungmin’s hand.

“It’s not going to fit through. You have to toss it over,” Seungmin said. He showed off that brilliant smile of his that made his right eye go all squinty and made Chan’s life a lot more difficult to live.

“Toss,” Chan repeated slowly like he didn’t know the definition of such a simple word.

Seungmin pointed up and Chan followed the movement to the top of the high fence. “Oh,” he said, and then looked back down at Seungmin. He became aware for the second time how close they were, even with a chain link fence between them. Awkwardly, Chan stepped back and tossed the ball upwards.

He didn’t use enough strength. Or, rather, all of his strength wasn’t enough. The ball banged against the fence with a horrid clatter and then dropped back to earth on his side of the fence, bouncing once, twice, and then hitting the bleachers with a thunderous clap. 

“Oh my god,” Chan moaned. He chased after the ball before it rolled too far away. “I’m such a fucking embarrassment. Sorry,” he called out, picking up the baseball and tossing it again. This time, at least, it cleared the top of the fence and bounced onto the bright green, freshly-cut grass of the baseball diamond. 

“Thanks,” Seungmin shouted. He sprinted after the ball, stooped down, scooped it up in his gloved hand and ran back to the dugout to rejoin his team. 

His whole body vibrating with anxiety, Chan sat back down on the bleachers and, as calmly as he could manage, said “T-t-that was Kim Seungmin, their b-b-best batter.”

“Mmhmm,” Woojin hummed. He had a very strong feeling Chan would walk the rest of the way into the trap. Woojin wouldn’t have to lift a finger. “I see.”

“I heard he’s really close to breaking one or two of the academy’s records.”

“Mmhmm.” 

“He’s left-handed.”

“Mmhmm.” 

“Okay, can you stop?” Chan spun to face Woojin, who did nothing but loosen his tie. Chan fumed. “Ugh. You’re incorrigible.”

Woojin took it as a compliment. “Now I get it,” he said. As expected, Chan had played all of his pieces elsewhere, allowing Woojin to strike him where he was vulnerable.

“What the hell are you talking about,” Chan squeaked, facing forward. He threw all of his attention at the players on the field who were spreading out for a mock-game. Of course, Kim Seungmin was first up at bat. “What’s there to get?”

“There’s a lot of things to get.”

“Like what?”

“Do you really want me to answer?”

“No. Yes. No.” 

Woojin snorted and looked away. “You’re as bright as a red onion.” 

“It’s hot out here.” 

Woojin made the definitive move, ensnaring one of Chan’s pieces. “You like him, don’t you?” 

“Yes. No. _ No _!” Chan jumped up, feeling exposed. Far too late, he realized his mistake.

“He might like you, too.”

“WHAT?” Chan’s voice got all high and screechy and echoed across the baseball field, matching the pitch and intensity of the coach’s whistle as the man signaled the start of the game. 

Woojin laughed. And laughed. And laughed.

Chan kicked Woojin in the shin. “You just shaved years off of my life. Don’t lie to me.” 

“He came over here just to talk to you,” Woojin explained between snorts. “It was so obvious a blind man could see it.”

“No, he came for the baseball.” Chan dropped back down onto the bleachers with a huff.

“The old, muddy baseball that’s been sitting under the bleachers probably since their last home game?” 

“Y-y-yeah. Exactly.” Chan wiped at his mouth. “The coach gets mad if they lose too many.”

Woojin laughed again.

“Stop it,” Chan squeaked out, elbowing his friend in the ribcage.

It took many seconds, but Woojin reeled in his laughter. “I mean, he knows your name, Chan. He knows you exist.”

“Our academy’s huge. He only knows me by coincidence. Yeah, coincidence. The broken window!”

Woojin went in for the finishing strike. “What does he smell like?” 

Chan willingly laid his neck down on the chopping block. “Like sweat and S’mores.”

Woojin fixed him with a look.

Slowly, Chan turned towards Woojin. They made eye contact. Chan hurriedly looked away, absolutely mortified. “Stop distracting me.” 

A loud _ crack _ interrupted their bickering and they both leaned forward to watch the ball half-disappear against the blue of the sky while Kim Seungmin took off running towards first base. Woojin gave Chan’s thigh a reassuring pat. “Looks like you missed the first pitch.” 

“Because of you,” Chan grunted, but he was grinning ear to ear. Just watching Seungmin run made him feel like he was being swept off his feet.

The coach shouted something that might have been a reprimand or perhaps even encouragement. It was difficult to tell when he was yelling across the field. Minho went back to his spot on the pitcher’s mound and rolled his shoulders back while the next batter stepped up to the plate. 

Woojin readjusting his blazer draped on top of his head now that the sun had shifted a bit. “He just looked at you.” 

“He didn’t,” Chan huffed. He reached up and snatched Woojin’s blazer off of his head. “Stop playing with me.”

“He’s standing right in front of us, Chan. I think I’d notice if he turned all the way around to look at us.”

Minho threw his pitch, fast and low to the ground. The batter swung too early. Even from this distance, the two Go players heard the thump of impact as Hyunjin caught the ball in his mitt. “Strike one!” 

“Seeing you squirm over this boy is so fascinating,” Woojin commented, propping his chin on his fist.

Chan threw Woojin’s blazer back in his face. “Shut up.” 

“You’re like an atom fiending for an electron,” Woojin kept on.

“Shut up.”

“He’s looking at you again.”

“Shut _ up _.” But was he? Chan looked up.

Seungmin was facing away from them. He’d stepped a significant distance away from first base, ready to bolt towards second.

“I hate you, Woojin,” Chan growled. “I hate your fucking guts.”

“I swear he was just looking this way,” said Woojin. “And you say _ I _ don’t pay attention.”

Chan smacked the bleachers between them. “You don’t!”

Minho threw a curveball. The batter hit it, sending it sailing towards left field.

Seungmin took off running, fast as a rabbit. He made it to second base right before the left fielder tossed the ball to the second baseman. A breath later and he would have been out.

Without meaning to, without knowing what came over him, Chan cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted, “Way to go, Kim Seungmin!”

This time it was obvious that Seungmin had turned to look at him. Chan could see Seungmin’s bright smile all the way from across the field. The sight of it made Chan lose all feeling in his legs and he sank back onto the bleachers, not even sure of exactly when he’d stood up. 

The mock-game went on another forty-five minutes before the coach called the end of practice. The boys did their cool-down stretches and started packing up their equipment, joking and horseplaying. 

“You’re actually into this, aren’t you?” Woojin asked, looking impressed.

“So are you,” Chan spat back.

“I only cheered when you cheered. I don’t know what the heck is going on. Is this the game with the touchdowns? Is one of them a goalie?”

“You’re being facetious,” Chan chided.

“Still, look at you…” Woojin waved a hand. “Being all excited about something that’s not Go.”

“I’ll never not like Go.”

“But this… this is new for you.”

“I’m allowed to like someone.” 

Woojin wiped an invisible tear from his cheek. “They grow up so fast.” 

Chan reached over and pinched him. Hard. Woojin squawked and leapt away from his fingers. “I’m allowed to have _ interests _ outside of the classroom.”

“Look, he’s coming over,” Woojin punched him in the shoulder and pointed towards home plate.

Chan stood up and approached the fence, both excited and terrified. He spotted Jeongin helping Hyunjin out of his bulky, protective catcher’s equipment but didn’t see Seungmin. Woojin could act like a fucking square sometimes but he had quite a vicious streak underneath his dumb smile. “Why would you do that to me,” Chan shouted, turning around to face Woojin but… Woojin was gone. Chan looked around. There! Woojin was already halfway across the grass, heading back towards the club room building. Now, why on Earth would he play a prank like that and run-

“Hey, Chan,” came a voice. Pure music to Chan’s ears.

A scream built up inside Chan’s head but, on the outside, he stayed calm and as put-together as he could manage under the sudden influx of nervousness. He turned around slowly. “Oh, hey Seungmin.” The fact that his voice didn’t crack was a complete miracle. “Great job today.”

“Thanks. It was fun.”

Chan had to remind himself to breathe. “You’re… incredible… at baseball.” Wow. That was smooth.

Seungmin nodded, as if he hadn’t really thought too much about it. “Guess so.”

“I-” Chan started, taking a quick glance over his shoulder to search for his friend but Woojin was long gone, probably laughing his head off at Chan’s expense. Chan looked back at Seungmin. “I’ve only been keeping up with you- with the _ team _ since-” Four hours ago. “-recently, but I think you’re all great players. A really strong team.” 

“Oh, that’s cool,” Seungmin said, propping his arm up on the fence. The movement accentuated his height and displayed the long, athletic shape of his body in the form-fitting uniform. 

“I was going to buy a ticket for Friday’s game. That’s cool, right?”

“Yeah, yeah.” 

There was an awkward pause. Neither of them seemed to know what to say. Chan bit his bottom lip, almost hard enough to bleed. He resisted the urge to flee. He probably couldn’t get his legs moving anyway.

“I was wondering-” Seungmin started at the exact same time Chan said “About Friday’s game-”

They both paused again. Chan grinned nervously. Seungmin smiled brightly at him. “What were you saying?”

“Nothing,” Chan said quickly, waving a dismissive hand. “What were you gonna say?” 

“You first.” 

This caught Chan off-guard. He stuttered. “I- I- I was just gonna say that I was coming to the game.”

“Yeah, you just told me,” Seungmin said. Did he just… chuckle? “Can’t wait to see you there.”

Chan lost all feeling in his legs. He caught himself on the fence before he fell over. “Yeah. Can’t wait to see you.” Shit. “Can’t wait to see the whole team.”

Another long pause. Far too late, Chan realized that he could extend his finger and touch Seungmin’s uniform - right on the shoulder - if he wanted to. He wanted to. He wanted to. But he didn’t. “What were you going to say? Earlier, I mean.” 

Now it was Seungmin’s turn to stammer. “W- Well I just wanted to k-know if you like… pizza.” 

Chan tilted his head, slow on the uptake. “Yeah. It’s pretty great. Why’d you ask?”

Seungmin hesitated. He leaned even more of his body against the fence. His shoulder brushed against Chan’s hand. Wow, Seungmin really did smell like sweat and S’mores. Seungmin said, “Did you want to go out?” He nudged the brim of his baseball cap backwards away from his forehead. Sunlight glinted off his pretty brown eyes _ just so _. “For pizza?” He glanced over his shoulder when someone from the team called his name. “Tonight?” 

Chan followed Seungmin’s gaze towards the dugout where most of the other boys were gathered, equipment in hand. Chan misunderstood the situation. “Go out with the team?” 

Seungmin turned back to him quickly, suddenly serious. “Just the two of us, Chan. Did you want to go out… Just the two of us. On a date.” 

If Chan wasn’t holding on to the fence with a white-knuckled grip, he probably would have floated into the sky like a loose balloon. “Yes.” Did that sound too overeager? “Why not?” Did that sound too noncommittal? “Sure!” 

Seungmin giggled in relief. “Okay,” he said, backing away. “I have to shower and stuff. Will you still be on campus around six?” He waited for Chan to shyly nod. “I’ll meet you by the fountain.”

“Yes.” Chan said again. “That sounds great. Phenomenal, even.” He was smiling so hard that his face hurt. He was breathing so shallowly that he was certainly mere moments from passing out. “See you then, Seungmin.” 

The star player turned away and sprinted after his team. For a moment, Chan just stood there, overwhelmed. Had that just happened? Had _ any _ of that just happened? Or was he dreaming right now, asleep in the club room? 

Then the excitement hit him all over again. Before he realized it, he was running towards the club room building, laughing like an absolute maniac. 

Boy, did he have a story for Woojin.

Perhaps he could tell it over a game of Go.

**Author's Note:**

> @[Curious Cat](https://curiouscat.me/TheSwingbyJHF)


End file.
